Flashback to this time last year, I was a bundle of emotions. As the days counting down to my move-in day dwindled, I didn’t feel any of the excitement that I always thought I would when I pictured myself going off to college. (Granted, I did always picture myself going to a Hogwarts-esque castle, but the Thomas Hunter Building resembles a castle if you squint). My freshman year of college was fast approaching, and the mere thought of it made me sweat as much as the Michelin man in a sauna.
Part of what scared me the most about leaving for school was not seeing my best friends every day. After a summer full of hanging out with my best friends from high school whenever possible, it was time to say goodbye. We approached it the way one might approach saying goodbye to a loved one moving to Mars with no chance of ever coming home. We wrote each other heartfelt letters to be opened the first night we were all settled in our dorm rooms, we watched “Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants” and similarly sappy friendship movies, and we ugly cried and hugged each other at what we deemed to be our “last hurrah.”
The thought of living without my parents started to terrify me. I was essentially allergic to any form of organization, I was used to the entertainment I was constantly provided by living with my mom and dad, and I didn’t even know how to make ramen! Although part of me yearned for independence, I started to question whether I was cut out for it or not.
On the day I moved in, I was a bit of a hot mess. I had previously been a regular mess, but I turned into a hot mess after stepping into the dorm room/personal indoor sand-less desert. I spent the next week holding back tears as I thought about my friends and family being far away and convincing myself that I had peaked in high school. (If high school were my peak, it would be a mountain so small that someone who was terrified of heights would probably scoff at it).
Luckily, I snapped out of that very quickly, and began to love my life in college. I met some amazing friends, tried new things, learned to be somewhat self-sufficient, and felt my overall levels of confidence and happiness improve significantly. My year was so great that I was actually incredibly sad to move out of my dorm in May, something I didn’t see coming after I spent my first week of school crying alone in my dorm room.
As I’m gearing up to move in and start my sophomore year of college, I’m feeling a lot more at ease. After almost a year of being apart, my friendships from home have gotten even stronger amazingly. While I’m of course extremely sad to be saying goodbye to them for the year again, it feels nice to know for a fact that our friendship can survive the distance. It was so nice to catch up with them after a year and hear about all the amazing things they did while at college, and I can’t wait to see them again during our next break. I'm looking forward to reconnecting with my friends from school whom I've missed all summer, and I can't wait to meet more incredible people who inspire me.
Although it was also so nice to live at home and spend time with my family this summer, I’m itching to have my own living space again in the city. Moving into my new room will probably take some getting used to, but I feel like it’ll be much easier to adjust this year with my new sense of confidence in my ability to keep myself both alive and relatively healthy.
I’m excited for sophomore year and all the new experiences and opportunities I'll encounter. Having one year of school and independence under my belt has done wonders to strengthen my confidence, and this year I know that I am capable of adjusting, something I was so worried about last year. While freshman year was unexpectedly incredible for me, I have a feeling that sophomore year might be even better.
